Portal:Music/Featured article
 | This page is currently inactive and is retained for historical reference. Either the page is no longer relevant or consensus on its purpose has become unclear. To revive discussion, seek broader input via a forum such as the village pump. See usage of Portal:Music/Recognized content, Special:Diff/1018325035. |
Instructions
The layout design for these subpages is at Portal:Music/Featured article/Layout.
- Add a new Featured article to the next available subpage.
- The list should only contain articles that have been given a quality rating of Wikipedia:Featured articles
- The "blurb" for all Featured articles should be approximately 10 lines, for appropriate formatting in the portal main page.
- Update "max=" to new total for its {{Random portal component}} on the main page.
Featured articles
Featured article 1
Portal:Music/Featured article/1
.jpg)
Delius's first successes came in Germany. In Delius's native Britain, it was 1907 before his music made regular appearances in concert programmes, after Thomas Beecham took it up. Beecham conducted the full premiere of A Mass of Life in London in 1909 and mounted a six-day Delius festival in London in 1929, as well as making gramophone recordings of many of Delius's works. After 1918 Delius became paralysed and blind, but completed some late compositions between 1928 and 1932 with the aid of an amanuensis, Eric Fenby. (Full article...)
Featured article 2
Portal:Music/Featured article/2
The Sex Pistols originally comprised vocalist Johnny Rotten, guitarist Steve Jones, drummer Paul Cook and bassist Glen Matlock. Matlock was replaced by Sid Vicious in early 1977. Their concerts repeatedly faced difficulties with organizers and authorities, and public appearances often ended in mayhem. In January 1978, at the end of a turbulent tour of the United States, Rotten left the band and announced its break-up. Vicious died of a heroin overdose in February 1979. In 1996, Rotten, Jones, Cook and Matlock reunited for the Filthy Lucre Tour; since 2002, they have staged further reunion shows and tours. (Full article...)
Featured article 3
Portal:Music/Featured article/3 Kathleen Mary Ferrier, CBE (22 April 1912 – 8 October 1953) was an English contralto singer who achieved an international reputation as a stage, concert and recording artist. Her death from cancer, at the height of her fame, was a shock to the musical world.
Ferrier did not take up singing seriously until 1937, when after winning a prestigious singing competition at the Carlisle Festival she began to receive offers of professional engagements as a vocalist. After the outbreak of the Second World War Ferrier was recruited by the Council for the Encouragement of [Music and] the Arts (CEMA), and in the following years became a regular performer at leading London and provincial venues, and made numerous BBC radio broadcasts.
As her reputation grew, Ferrier formed close working relationships with major musical figures, including Benjamin Britten, Sir John Barbirolli, Bruno Walter and the accompanist Gerald Moore. She became known internationally through her three tours to the United States between 1948 and 1950 and her many visits to continental Europe. (Full article...)
Featured article 4
Portal:Music/Featured article/4 The music of the United States reflects the country's multi-ethnic population through a diverse array of styles. Among the country's most internationally-renowned genres are hip hop, blues, country, rhythm and blues, jazz, barbershop, pop, techno, and rock and roll. After Japan, the United States has the world's second largest music market with a total retail value of 3,635.2 million dollars in 2010 and its music is heard around the world. Since the beginning of the 20th century, some forms of American popular music have gained a near global audience.
Many American cities and towns have vibrant music scenes which, in turn, support a number of regional musical styles. Along with musical centers such as Philadelphia, Seattle, New York City, San Francisco, New Orleans, Detroit, Minneapolis, Chicago, Atlanta, Nashville, Austin, and Los Angeles, many smaller cities such as Asbury Park, New Jersey have produced distinctive styles of music. The Cajun and Creole traditions in Louisiana music, the folk and popular styles of Hawaiian music, and the bluegrass and old time music of the Southeastern states are a few examples of diversity in American music. (Full article...)
Featured article 5
Portal:Music/Featured article/5
Narayan was born in Udaipur and learned to play the sarangi at an early age. All India Radio, Lahore, hired Narayan as an accompanist for vocalists in 1944. He moved to Delhi following the partition of India in 1947, but wishing to go beyond accompaniment, Narayan moved to Mumbai in 1949 to work in Indian cinema. Narayan became a concert solo artist in 1956, and later gave up accompaniment. He recorded solo albums and began to tour America and Europe in the 1960s. Narayan taught Indian and foreign students and performed, frequently outside of India, into the 2000s. (Full article...)
Featured article 6
Portal:Music/Featured article/6
After its initial successful run in Venice the opera was performed in Bologna before returning to Venice for the 1640–41 season. The music became known in modern times through the 19th century discovery of an incomplete manuscript score. After its publication in 1922 the score's authenticity was widely questioned, but by the 1950s the work was generally accepted as Monteverdi's, and after revivals in Vienna and Glyndebourne in the early 1970s it became increasingly popular. (Full article...)
Featured article 7
Portal:Music/Featured article/7 Niandra Lades and Usually Just a T-Shirt is the debut solo album by John Frusciante, released on March 8, 1994, on American Recordings. Frusciante released the album after encouragement from several friends, who told him that there was "no good music around anymore."
Niandra Lades and Usually Just a T-Shirt combines avant-garde and stream-of-consciousness styles, with guitar, piano and various effects and synthesizers on a four-track recorder. The album's first half, Niandra Lades, was recorded before Frusciante left the Red Hot Chili Peppers in 1992; during the tour for Blood Sugar Sex Magik. The second half, Usually Just a T-Shirt, was recorded while the band was on tour in the months leading up to Frusciante's departure. Niandra Lades and Usually Just a T-Shirt sold poorly upon its release in 1994, and was taken off the market, only to be re-released in 1999. (Full article...)
Featured article 8
Portal:Music/Featured article/8 The Dark Side of the Moon is the eighth studio album by the English progressive rock band Pink Floyd, released in March 1973. It built on ideas explored in the band's earlier recordings and live shows. Its themes include conflict, greed, the passage of time, and mental illness, the latter partly inspired by Barrett's deteriorating mental state.
The suite was developed during live performances and was premiered several months before studio recording began. The new material was recorded in two sessions in 1972 and 1973 at Abbey Road Studios in London. The group used some of the most advanced recording techniques of the time, including multitrack recording and tape loops. The album's iconic sleeve features a prism that represents the band's stage lighting, the record's lyrical themes, and keyboardist Richard Wright's request for a "simple and bold" design.
With an estimated 50 million copies sold, it is Pink Floyd's most commercially successful album and one of the best-selling albums worldwide. The Dark Side of the Moon is one of Pink Floyd's most popular albums among fans and critics, and is frequently ranked as one of the greatest rock albums of all time. (Full article...)
Featured article 9
Portal:Music/Featured article/9
Drawing on several of his earlier "Bab Ballad" poems, Gilbert imbued the plot with mirth and silliness. The opera's humour focuses on love between members of different social classes and lampoons the British class system in general. Pinafore also pokes good-natured fun at patriotism, party politics, the Royal Navy, and the rise of unqualified people to positions of authority. The title of the piece comically applies the name of a garment for girls and women, a pinafore, to the fearsome symbol of a naval warship. (Full article...)
Featured article 10
Portal:Music/Featured article/10
In 1882, aged 29, he was one of the founding professors of the Royal College of Music, where he taught composition for the rest of his life. From 1887 he was also the professor of music at Cambridge. As a teacher, Stanford was sceptical about modernism, and based his instruction chiefly on classical principles as exemplified in the music of Brahms. Among his pupils were rising composers whose fame went on to surpass his own, such as Gustav Holst and Ralph Vaughan Williams. As a conductor, Stanford held posts with the Bach Choir and the Leeds triennial music festival.
Stanford composed a substantial number of concert works, including seven symphonies, but his best-remembered pieces are his choral works for church performance, chiefly composed in the Anglican tradition. (Full article...)
Featured article 11
Portal:Music/Featured article/11 Joy Division were an English rock band formed in 1976 in Salford, Greater Manchester. Originally named Warsaw, the band primarily consisted of Ian Curtis (vocals and occasional guitar), Bernard Sumner (guitar and keyboards), Peter Hook (bass guitar and backing vocals) and Stephen Morris (drums and percussion).
Joy Division rapidly evolved from their initial punk rock influences to develop a sound and style that pioneered the post-punk movement of the late 1970s. Their self-released 1978 debut EP, An Ideal for Living, drew the attention of the Manchester television personality Tony Wilson. Joy Division's debut album, Unknown Pleasures, was released in 1979 on Wilson's independent record label, Factory Records, and drew critical acclaim from the British press. Despite the band's growing success, vocalist Ian Curtis was beset with depression and personal difficulties, and found it increasingly difficult to perform at live concerts.
On the eve of the band's first American tour in May 1980, Curtis committed suicide. Joy Division's posthumously released second album, Closer (1980), and the single "Love Will Tear Us Apart" became the band's highest charting releases. (Full article...)
Featured article 12
Portal:Music/Featured article/12
Although Clarke wrote little, due in part to her ideas about the role of a female composer, her work was recognised for its compositional skill. Most of her works have yet to be published (or have only recently been published), and were largely forgotten after she stopped composing. Scholarship and interest in her compositions revived in 1976. The Rebecca Clarke Society was established in 2000 to promote the study and performance of her music. (Full article...)
Featured article 13
Portal:Music/Featured article/13
Although sometimes described as "minimalist", the score displays a variety of musical styles, embracing minimalism after the manner of Philip Glass alongside passages echoing 19th-century composers such as Wagner and Johann Strauss. With these ingredients, Adams mixes Stravinskian 20th-century neoclassicism, jazz references, and big band sounds reminiscent of Nixon's youth in the 1930s.
Following the 1987 premiere, the opera received mixed reviews; some critics dismissed the work, predicting it would soon vanish. However, recent critical opinion has tended to recognize the work as a significant and lasting contribution to American opera. (Full article...)
Featured article 14
Portal:Music/Featured article/14
Sasha has produced multiple UK-charting singles and has remixed tracks for artists such as Madonna and The Chemical Brothers. His remix of Felix da Housecat's "Watching Cars Go By" earned him a 2004 Grammy nomination. Sasha's remixing and production often combine electronic music genres, making it difficult for critics to pinpoint his musical style.
After achieving success as a producer and DJ, Sasha worked with younger DJs and producers such as BT and James Zabiela. His use of live audio engineering equipment helped popularise technological innovations among DJs who formerly relied on records and turntables. In 2007, he formed a record label with Renaissance Records called emFire, which is the exclusive outlet for his new music. (Full article...)
Featured article 15
Portal:Music/Featured article/15
Guinness World Records described McCartney as the "most successful composer and recording artist of all time", with 60 gold discs and sales of over 100 million albums and 100 million singles. Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a solo artist in March 1999, McCartney has written, or co-written 32 songs that have reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, and as of 2012[update] he has sold over 15.5 million RIAA-certified units in the United States. (Full article...)
Featured article 16
Portal:Music/Featured article/16
From the outset, performers have comprised a mixture of British and Commonwealth singers and international guest stars, but fostering the careers of singers from within the company was a consistent policy of the early years. Among the many guest performers have been Maria Callas, Plácido Domingo, Kirsten Flagstad, Hans Hotter, Birgit Nilsson, Luciano Pavarotti and Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. Among those who have risen to international prominence from the ranks of the company are Geraint Evans, Joan Sutherland, Kiri Te Kanawa and Jon Vickers. (Full article...)
Featured article 17
Portal:Music/Featured article/17
Frusciante has received critical recognition for his guitar playing, ranking at number 18 on Rolling Stone's list of "The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" in 2003; and again in a second list penned in 2011, where he ranked at number 72. He was voted "The Best Guitarist of the Last 30 Years" in a 2010 BBC poll called "The Axe Factor". Frusciante was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Red Hot Chili Peppers on April 14, 2012. (Full article...)
Featured article 18
Portal:Music/Featured article/18
Backmasking was popularised by the Beatles who used backward instrumentation on their 1966 album Revolver. Artists have since used backmasking for artistic, comedic and satiric effect, on both analogue and digital recordings. The technique has also been used to censor words or phrases for "clean" releases of rap songs.
Backmasking has been a controversial topic in the United States since the 1980s, when allegations from Christian groups of its use for Satanic purposes were made against prominent rock musicians, leading to record-burning protests and proposed anti-backmasking legislation by state and federal governments. (Full article...)
Featured article 19
Portal:Music/Featured article/19
Smetana's reputation as the founding father of Czech music has endured in his native country, where advocates have raised his status above that of his contemporaries and successors. However, relatively few of Smetana's works are in the international repertory, and most foreign commentators tend to regard Antonín Dvořák as a more significant Czech composer. (Full article...)
Featured article 20
Portal:Music/Featured article/20
Accompanied by guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black, Presley was the most important popularizer of rockabilly, an uptempo, backbeat-driven fusion of country and rhythm and blues. Presley's first RCA single, "Heartbreak Hotel", released in January 1956, was a number-one hit. He became the leading figure of the newly popular sound of rock and roll with a series of network television appearances and chart-topping records. His energized interpretations of songs, many from African-American sources, and his uninhibited performance style made him enormously popular—and controversial. In November 1956, he made his film debut in Love Me Tender. (Full article...)
Featured article 21
Portal:Music/Featured article/21 Selena Quintanilla-Pérez (April 16, 1971 – March 31, 1995), known mononymously as Selena, was an American singer-songwriter, fashion designer and entrepreneur. Selena was born as the last child of a Mexican American father and a half-Cherokee mother. She released her first LP record at the age of twelve with her Selena y Los Dinos band. At the 1987 Tejano Music Awards, she won Female Vocalist of the Year; she won the award eight consecutive times after that starting in 1989. She landed her first major recording contract with EMI Latin in 1989 and released her debut album with them that same year. Her brother and principal record producer, A.B. Quintanilla, began writing materials for Selena to record. "Como La Flor", the lead single for Entre a Mi Mundo (1992), peaked at number six on the US Billboard Hot Latin Tracks. It launched Selena's Mexico tour which expanded her fan base and gained critical acclaim from critics who cite it as being her signature song and as well as being a fan favorite recording.
The chairman of EMI Records at the time, Charles Koppelman, launched Selena's crossover contract. He believed that Selena reached her peak in the Spanish-speaking market and wanted to propel her as an American solo pop artist to expand her career. After performing at a sold out concert at the Houston Astrodome in February 1995, Selena's father and manager, Abraham Quintanilla, Jr. noticed that money was missing from Selena's boutique. Abraham, Selena and her sister and drummer Suzette Quintanilla held a meeting with Saldívar to discuss inconsistencies concerning disappearing funds. She was then banned by Abraham from his recording studio Q-Productions. Saldívar bought a gun a few weeks later and tried luring Selena to meet her alone at her hotel room. On 31 March 1995, Selena was killed by Saldívar. Selena's death affected people in Hispanic communities, many candlelight vigils took place, as well as other memorials from fans. Two weeks later, Governor of Texas at the time, George W. Bush, declared 16 April as "Selena Day" in Texas. (Full article...)
Featured article 22
Portal:Music/Featured article/22
.jpg)
The guide was critically well received, earning praise for its extensive discography, Christgau's judgment and colorful writing. Reviewers noted his opinionated tastes, analytical commentary, pithy language, and critical quips. The book appeared on several expert lists of popular music literature. A staple of rock-era reference works, Christgau's Record Guide became widely popular in libraries as a source for popular music studies and as an authoritative guide for fellow critics, record collectors, and music shops. (Full article...)
Archive
The portal used to display one featured article at a time; a new selection was chosen every month or so. An archive of the old selections is at Portal:Music/Featured articles.
Nominations
- Adding articles
- Feel free to add Featured quality Music articles to the above list.
- If you are unsure or do not know how to add an entry, feel free to post a question, suggestion or nomination here below, or at the talk page Portal talk:Music.